Tag Archives: office space

There is a lot of empty office space on 11th Ave. WeWork fizzled. CENTRL Office is moving in.

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The real estate listing for the Kelly Springfield office space floors

 

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The big hopes of global office space giant WeWork leasing an entire Capitol Hill building went poof earlier this year. A smaller, West Coast office space giant is moving in.

Portland-based CENTRL Office has a deal for a new lease to take over the former WeWork floors of 11th Ave’s Kelly Springfield development, the preservation incentive-boosted, five-story office development that rises above the auto row-era bones of the neighborhood’s former Value Village.

CHS reported on WeWork shuttering the ambitious Capitol Hill location earlier this year amid the company’s massive bankruptcy.

The Kelly Springfield project from property owner Legacy Commercial and architects at Ankrom Moisan created three stories of new offices over the old auto row-era structure. That building was once the neighborhood’s Value Village and before that, REI, and long before that, the Kelly Springfield Motor Truck Company. CHS reported on the history and plans for the property in 2017 as the final designs for the project came together. Continue reading →

Cascade Public Media, KCTS, and Crosscut are working on a new name — They now have a new home on Broadway

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A rendering of the new reception area (Image: Crosscut)

Cascade Public Media’s new home (Image: Childhaven)

The workers of Seattle public television KCTS and Crosscut are moving onto Broadway.

Cascade Public Media says it is in the process of opening its new First Hill headquarters at 316 Broadway. It acquired the building from Childhaven, a provider of therapeutic services for children who have experience trauma and neglect, for $23 million in 2022, according to King County Records.

The media nonprofit says employees of the public television station and Crosscut are now working in the newly reopened Broadway facility and that the organization is preparing the building’s “several large gathering spaces” to host KCTS and Crosscut events with the “potential to enable new types of community engagement” for the organization.

“The thing this building offers is a chance for us to reimagine the ways in which we interact with the community,” president and CEO Rob Dunlop said in the Crosscut story announcing the opening.

The future could also involve the use of the building for community events and gatherings, Cascade said. Meanwhile, there are other changes afoot including a plan for a massive sign marking the headquarters place in the city’s changing media landscape. That sign will likely help introduce a new brand — Cascade says it is in the midst of an effort to rename itself after decades in the city. Continue reading →

Amid massive bankruptcy, office space giant WeWork closing on Capitol Hill

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(Image: cplinc.com)

A view from the Capitol Hill WeWork (Image: CHS)

The Capitol Hill location of the WeWork office space chain is closing, leaving the four-year-old, five-story, preservation-minded Kelly Springfield development it has occupied with an uncertain future.

The Capitol Hill shutdown on 11th Ave comes as the company once valued at $47 billion has come crashing to earth under the pandemic-driven changes in work habits and the imploding value of the company’s global real estate portfolio.

A company spokesperson confirmed the planned Seattle closure with CHS Thursday following reports that staff was informing co-working customers that the location was shutting down.

“As part of WeWork’s strategic restructuring efforts, we have made the difficult decision to end our operations at Kelly-Springfield,” the spokesperson said in a statement sent to CHS. “We have offered affected members the option to relocate, with our support, to our other Seattle locations and deeply apologize for any inconvenience this may cause.”

The company did not offer updates on the other Seattle locations it operates but said it would continue to be part of the city. Continue reading →

Looking for ideas for what to do with Seattle’s unwanted office space? Check out Capitol Hill

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A view from the Capitol Hill WeWork (Image: CHS)

There was a time in the mid 2010s when Capitol Hill’s leading real estate and development experts were making a big push to create more office space projects in the neighborhood to better balance what they said had been a flood of housing and nightlife investment in the area.

They could not have known, exactly, what was coming next but the last thing Seattle needs now are more desks.

The Seattle Office of Planning and Community Development has put out “a competitive Call for Ideas” for how the city could convert its increasingly unused downtown office space into housing.

“Share your vision for the future of a Seattle Downtown that is more balanced between residential uses and civic and office uses than today,” the city’s call for submissions reads. “We seek ideas to create vibrant neighborhoods where people live, work, shop, and play.”

The effort comes as Seattle grapples with how to bring more people into its downtown as COVID-19 “working from home” trends have continued. Continue reading →

Indies Workshop game industry coworking space ready for another level on Capitol Hill

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The Indies Workshop crew (Image: CHS)

Indies Workshop, a coworking space for video game developers, is reopening after being shut down since the pandemic in a new location in Capitol Hill on 12th Ave. It is the company’s second tour on the Hill.

“Energy levels are high,” said Christopher Floyd, founder and owner of the space now making its home in Capitol Hill’s Ballou Wright Building.

With the new location, Floyd is hoping to continue doing what has been done before – providing a space for video game developers – and more social events to bring people from the industry together.

Floyd created the workshop after seeing a need for the gaming industry in Seattle to and build community through in-person collaboration. He saw a lot of the gaming industry was located in Seattle but people weren’t connected to each other. Continue reading →

Local real estate company touches up new Capitol Hill home office

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Seattle-based real estate investment company Timberlane Partners has a new office on Capitol Hill. Timberlane purchased the 614 Boylston Ave E property for over $2.4 million in September. Shortly thereafter, the company began working towards office space renovations on the first level of the two-story building.

Despite its pristine exterior, the Boylston Ave E property is over a century old, having been built in 1906. It was purchased by the owners of brand design firm Phinney Bischoff in the mid-90s, and sold to Timberlane in 2021 after nearly three decades of ownership. Continue reading →

Law and coffee — Firm’s move to Capitol Hill will include overhaul of E Olive Way building

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Philipp

A downtown law firm plans to make the move to Capitol Hill, and it’s planning to bring a new coffee shop along for the ride.

Aeon Law, an intellectual property firm currently in Pioneer Square, is coming to the neighborhood for a number of reasons, said Adam L.K. Philipp, the firm’s founder.

“Downtown isn’t as appealing as it used to be,” he said.

He noted that most clients no longer expect to come into the office for meetings, so a prestige address is not the sort of thing to worry about too much anymore. And it’s not just clients staying away from the office, many on the staff work remotely as well. That started them thinking that it might be nice to make a new place the changing reality of office work, where only five-15 members of the firm will likely be in the office on any given day.

“We wanted a better environment, a better workspace,” Philipp said.

The new location has other advantages, with most of the workers in the firm not driving, they look forward to being just a couple blocks from the Iight rail in a walkable neighborhood; Philipp sounded genuinely excited to hear that HMart would soon be opening nearby.

Furthermore, he said the commercial landlords have not been sympathetic to COVID-related issues.

“If that’s how landlords are going to treat us, why don’t I find a better landlord – myself,” Philipp said. Continue reading →

With virtual reality gaming acquisition, Facebook joins Capitol Hill’s office space mix

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It’s a small project as far as the tech giant is concerned but for those who have fostered hopes of office space bringing more workers and activity to Pike/Pine, there will be a bit of celebrating in welcoming Facebook to Capitol Hill.

According to city construction and land use permits, the tech giant is making plans for a new office space project above 10th Ave and Cal Anderson Park on an upper floor of the historic Odd Fellows Building. The tenant improvement will create new offices on the fourth floor of the building, joining an upstairs tenant mix including the Century Ballroom. Street level tenants of the building include the Oddfellows cafe, the Molly Moon’s ice cream shop, and the Fleet Feet running shoe store. Continue reading →

Capitol Hill tech firm Add3 eyeing deal for new headquarters, space for new club in former R Place building

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(Image: CHS)

The likely future for a history-rich building formerly the longtime home of an icon in Capitol Hill gay nightlife could be a new headquarters for one of the neighborhood’s home-grown tech firms while making space for a new player to enter the Pike/Pine club scene.

Digital marketing firm Add3 is under contract to purchase the 1917-built Bothell Motors garage building at E Pine and Boylston, according to construction permit documents. You might know it is as the former home of R Place.

According to the documents, the Capitol Hill tech firm is making plans to purchase the building and overhaul it as a new headquarters with offices and meeting rooms. The effort would include “core and shell renovation” of the three-story, unreinforced masonry building, maintaining nightlife use on the ground floors and creating new office space above. The $1.1 million construction project with Mallet Construction would overhaul the first two floors formerly home to the longtime Capitol Hill gay bar in preparation for a new tenant. Continue reading →

Reopening: Capitol Hill’s Office Nomads leads way in figuring out what COVID-era coworking means

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(Image: Office Nomads)

The new world of COVID-19 brings drastically changed landscapes for many Capitol Hill businesses. Born on Boylston 13 years ago, “Seattle’s original coworking community” Office Nomads has left its street behind and transitioned online after closing its office space at the end of July.

“The thread that binds all of our members is that they can work from anywhere,” Office Nomads co-owner and founder Susan Dorsch said. “All of our members prefer to work together and to work in a shared workspace, I do as well, but what we’re doing right now is not about preferences. What we’re doing right now is about safety.”

Office Nomads has long served as a hub for remote workers seeking a communal working environment — including students, entrepreneurs and freelancers — at its Boylston Ave spot. Since the business began in 2007, a burgeoning scene of coworking spaces has emerged on the Hill. But coworking’s day appears to have been a short one. COVID-19 has snuffed out thousands of jobs here and sent thousands more into a semi-permanent “working from home” lifestyle. Office space and social distancing just don’t mix. Continue reading →